Backpacks often include waist belts to help distribute some weight of a load away from shoulder straps and/or to secure a lower portion of the bag against a wearer's body to prevent the bag from bouncing or jostling excessively during use. Especially in larger packs with frames, pads are often provided in such waist belts to provide additional cushioning or anchor points for engaging the hips of a wearer to facilitate load transfer. However, the pads provided are often bulky, difficult to customize for a specific wearer, and not practical to remove in situations where a load is light enough that the pads are not needed. In smaller packs without frames, the load that can fit within the bag can typically be borne comfortably by the shoulders, so corresponding waist belts are usually used primarily for securing purposes instead of load-bearing. Hence, many waist belts on smaller packs are provided without pads and without any mechanism to add pads if desired. In some scenarios, this may provide a limitation on the ability of a wearer to effectively carry heavier objects like tools from the belt.